By Stephanie Mariel Petrellese

The recent tension among the Village's four property owners' associations, who have not been able to reach agreement on the questions to be posed to residents in an opinion poll scheduled to be held on Oct. 7th, became a subject of debate at the Sept. 11th meeting of the Garden City Board of Trustees. The Oct. 7th poll has since been canceled [see related article].

The Eastern and Estates Property Owners' Associations originally wanted two options presented to the public: the AvalonBay proposal as detailed in the Report of the Mayor's Committee on St. Paul's released in July, or demolition. The Central and Western POAs want the poll to include one question: vote either "yes" or "no" for the AvalonBay proposal as presented in the Mayor's Report.

The Central POA went even further. Their directors and officers voted unanimously at a Sept. 9th meeting that any poll held without the support of all four POAs would be "invalid and a breech of the Community Agreement."

When a consensus could not be reached after several meetings of the Joint Conference Committee of property owners' associations, the Eastern and Estates POA decided to go forward with the poll even though the format was not supported by the other two POAs. However, they had decided to add the option of mothballing/stabilization as a concession to the Western POA in the hopes of gaining their support.

Mothballing/stabilization would give an option to those residents who don't want AvalonBay or demolition. However, it is not recommended in the Mayor's Report, which reads: "In the Committee's opinion, spending $13.9 million and paying at least $200,000 a year to maintain an uninhabitable building with no planned future use is a waste of time and money."

Deputy Mayor John Mauk said he is concerned with giving residents the mothballing option because in his opinion demolition is the only option if AvalonBay is not selected. As former chairman of the Mayor's Committee on St. Paul's, he believes all other avenues have been explored, and nobody has been able to come up with another viable option for the building.

Trustee Nicholas Episcopia reminded the public that according to a 2004 survey conducted by the POAs with the assistance of Adelphi University, mothballing received only 6 percent of the vote. The top two responses were private use and demolition.

At the Sept. 11th Board meeting, Dennis Donnelly, president of the Eastern Property Owners' Association and chair of the JCC, acknowledged the divisiveness among the POAs and announced that the JCC planned to reconvene once more in an attempt to come to a consensus.

"I think the Board is looking for a number of avenues to receive public feedback on this issue," responded Mayor Peter Bee. "...There are tools through the AvalonBay presentations, there are tools through this meeting, there are tools through our property owners' association meetings, tools through the vote which you contemplate in holding, and it may well be that an additional tool might be a professional pollster."

Upon hearing that the POAs planned to try once again to settle their differences, Second Deputy Mayor Thomas Lamberti withdrew a motion that called for the Board of Trustees to disavow the poll that was going to be held without the official support of the West and Central.

Mayor Bee was happy that Lamberti took the item off the agenda. "I think that we expressed on numerous occasions our desire that the POAs assist the board in gathering public input," he said. "We did not specify the precise manner in which that might take place and I'm not aware that on any other occasion that we have ever rejected input from the public before that input was even provided, so to put a motion on the table that we should reject the results of two of the POAs seeking public opinion before they had even done so was without precedent in my mind. I think we should leave the politics of the POAs to the POAs and let them have as much discretion and flexibility as we can afford them, so I am pleased and gratified that what I consider to be an ill-conceived motion has been withdrawn."

Lamberti explained that he asked for the motion to be placed on the agenda after he received an e-mail from CPOA president Patricia DiMattia that two of the POAs had decided to go forward with the poll without the support of the Central and West. Calling it a "rogue election," Lamberti said the JCC should have reported back to the Board of Trustees when they couldn't agree.

Trustee Donald Brudie said it would be improper and illegal for the "runaway committee" to hold a poll without the support of all four POAs. However, he later corrected himself after Donnelly told him it would not be illegal to hold a poll.

Brudie used the POA polling issue as a springboard to once again state his opposition to the AvalonBay proposal. "The St. Paul's issue is a very serious one," he said.

According to the proposal, AvalonBay will be permitted to give the Village payments in lieu of taxes, known as PILOTs, for 20 years, for a total of $3.6 million. If the Village was to collect full taxes on the property during that 20-year period, the total would be $30.7 million. Brudie argued that residents will have to make up the $27.1 million difference.

Garden City resident Walter McKenna was puzzled how this would happen since the Village is currently collecting no property taxes on the property. If the Village goes forward with the AvalonBay deal, they will at least receive payments in lieu of taxes, more commonly known as PILOTs.

He is also concerned that it will take 99 years for the ground lease to expire. Brudie has said he does not want to see the building demolished, but if that is the ultimate decision, he believes the Village will benefit from having seven acres of land with relatively little demand placed upon it.

Brudie also is concerned with how the recently passed affordable housing law will impact the St. Paul's project. The bill would not apply if the developer sought to build less than the maximum density allowed. The options to the 10 percent density bonus, to be selected by the village, would be to have the developer build affordable housing on another site in the village or pay a sum of money (at $185,000 per affordable housing unit) into a fund maintained by the village, by another municipality within the county or by the L.I. Housing Partnership. The definition of "affordable" is a family making up to 130 percent of the median income on Long Island. This would equate to $120,000 for a family of four.

Trustee John Watras also weighed in with his opinion on the St. Paul's issue. He said AvalonBay should come back to the Village with "something better" that includes more public space and use.

Saying "this must end," Lamberti, who chairs the Mayor's Committee on St. Paul's, said he expects the Board to make a final decision by December.

Among the usual group of residents who regularly attend Board meetings and comment on the AvalonBay proposal were a few new voices. Brian Pinola, president of the Garden City Historical Society, said he is amazed that demolition of a historic structure is an option. "I can't believe it when I hear this," he said.

Chad Cascadden, a father of three boys under the age of 4, said he believes he is representative of the younger families in the Village, who think the decision is between AvalonBay and demolition. He said he feels no matter what the outcome, the Board will ultimately "do the right thing."

Alison Metzler said she is willing to pay higher taxes in order to save St. Paul's. She said there are alternate ways to save the building and suggested the possibility of using it as a school. Deputy Mayor Mauk responded that it is illegal because the state prohibits the use of educational funds for historic preservation.

Joan Donahue was moved to tears when she described how the AvalonBay project would "ruin" her family's quality of life. She has three children and is concerned that the proposed swimming pool on the property would be an enticing danger to middle school students, even with the legally required fencing and alarms.

Matthew Whalen, AvalonBay's vice president of development, announced that they have been getting public feedback for close to a year. "I wanted to make a brief comment and just base it upon some of the recent acrimony that has taken place on how to make a decision about St. Paul's, which I think everyone will agree does not help anyone...There is obviously not a lot of consensus on other issues surrounding St. Paul's. But if there is any consensus within the resident feedback that we get it's related to making a final decision on St. Paul's. It's very tough to argue against that, I would think. We encourage the trustees to work together to define that process, to bring it to a final decision. There is a lot of ongoing debate on the structure of how that decision will be made and we encourage you to take the leadership role to do that and to help the residents to get what they're asking for, which is a final decision."